"I could stare out your window and fuck you tonight," Zoë Kravitz, the lead singer of Lolawolf, sings in "Drive". Affecting a low, soothing pitch, Kravitz under-sings or simply drives in her own lane, at her own pace. The song never seems to move in the direction you think it’s moving in; there’s no build-up, no climax. There’s not much beyond a modest, sustained vibrato and a simple chord progression. It’s repetitive, lulling the listener to sleep.

Zoë's place in the Black Weirdo/carefree black girl ecosystem is marked by a lack of urgency. Zoë's affected chillness in "Drive" seems try-hard, but she’s not in a hurry to pop off because she doesn’t have to be in a hurry. Nepotism—and the power that comes with it—makes things low-stakes. She has nothing to lose and everything to gain, so she can under-sing and under-perform all she wants.

Last November, the circulation of a private document—actually, a digital image of a private document—suggested something miraculous was possibly about to happen. Titled "Release Confirmation" and stamped with Parkwood Entertainment and Columbia Records’ logos, that document circulated as tantalizing evidence that, just maybe, there was more Beyoncé music coming…not just soon, but maybe immediately? Turned out, no, it was a fake (of course), and there wouldn’t be a repeat of Queen Bey’s epochal December 2013 sudden-release of her self-titled "video album"—the most awe-inspiring release stunt since Radiohead’s 2007 In Rainbows gambit—but merely an expanded re-issue of that LP with a couple bonus tracks.

Add up the elements of this all-too-brief mystery/hoax and you get a perfect encapsulation of what might be called the recording industry’s ever-evolving circulatory system a decade-and-a-half into its digital era. Unconfirmed, leaked evidence about a new release is often accompanied by the suspicion that it all might be engineered by the artist—all part of a broader sense of anticipation that with a famous, boundary-pushing artist, something new might just drop out of nowhere. Stunt releases function as political statements, bursts of emotional expression, savvy branding ploys, or corporate alliances, and often a combination of one or more. The rationales for releases mutate as quickly as the technologies emerge, and for an increasing number of artists, artistic expression isn’t merely the domain of recordings and performances, but extends to the domain of promotion and release.

An Italian EDM duo called Nari and Milani are in hot water over an apparent case of plagiarism. Numerous listeners have pointed out that Nari and Milani's new single "Triangle" sounds suspiciously like the French producer Mr. Oizo's 1999 song "Flat Beat". Indeed, Mr. Oizo himself took note of the song's resemblance to his own and called out the Italian duo, suggesting, "good promo plan for cheap: copy a classic tune and put it out like it's yours. also don't forget to look douchee" (sic). (However you choose to spell it, they do actually look pretty douchey.)

I cried when I wrote this songSue me if I play too longThis brother is freeI'll be what I want to be

- Steely Dan, "Deacon Blues"

Coachella is the post-South by Southwest in-earnest start to music-festival season each year. Its organizer, Goldenvoice, shells out untold cash for a lineup varied in font point sizes, one that sets a tone for fest season and makes headlines far outside its native California. It’s a fest-season tentpole that compels inactive legacy acts to reactivate, broken-up bands to get back together and overseas acts that rarely play stateside to make the trip.

This year’s Coachella lineup was a good example of what happens when a youth-driven festival economy meets a nostalgia-driven culture. And Coachella’s most nostalgic (read: oldest, most Boomer Generation friendly) bookings this year are AC/DC, a headliner, and Steely Dan. The latter is particularly bizarre. The Dan became an over-the-hill punchline in 2001, when it was awarded a string of four Grammys including Album of the Year for Two Against Nature in an upset win (beating out Kid Aand Midnite Vultures, among others). It was one of a series of tone-deaf moves by the Grammys to reward Steely Dan more for its career accomplishments, not necessarily Two Against Nature, per se. That the Dan has toured steadily since then—nurturing its legacy with modest gimmickry like multi-night stands and playing its classic albums in sequence, in full—after a long live hiatus doesn’t seem to ingratiate them.

In view of last year’s celebrity nude photo scandal, the endless leaking of U.S. government documents, and the infamous Sony hacks, 2015 arrives at a time when the leaking of unauthorized content is neither surprising nor uncommon. If 2014 proved anything, it’s that the kind of piracy that has plagued the music industry for decades is a de facto part of wider culture—making the issue of how we protect our creative materials more political than ever.

While music piracy is decades old, the sense of entitlement that’s often coupled with hacking culture has seemingly reached new depths. Leaks are happening further upstream in the creative process; unmastered demos are making it into the public sphere not just before they are authorized, but before they are finished—so that whatever leaks is a rougher and rougher edit of whatever it will ultimately be—a song, a demo, an album. The insidiousness of this process is what recently inspired Madonna's comments that the leak of six songs from her Rebel Heart LP amounted to "artistic rape" and "a form of terrorism", and the same reason why websites like HasItLeaked.com attract over 1 million unique visitors a month. People in the spotlight are often betrayed by their private files; "privacy" is now more of a theoretical concept than reality.

During an interview with Oprah last Spring, producer and rapper Pharrell Williams dubbed himself "New Black". In his words: "The New Black doesn't blame other races for our issues. The New Black dreams and realizes that it's not a pigmentation; it's a mentality. And it's either going to work for you, or it's going to work against you. And you've got to pick the side you're gonna be on." Pharrell’s remarks floated around ideas about being black—"our issues," our "pigmentation," our pesky way of "working against" ourselves. These ideas put the onus of racism on black people. While Pharrell likely believes he was imparting wisdom, rather than being condescending, his words still stunk of the familiar "pull up your pants" stench.

When entertainers open their mouths to talk about something other than themselves, there’s always tension. The tension is there when Kanye "rants"; it’s there when Azealia Banks talks about black feminism in one breath, and utters Bill Cosby rape apologia in another; it’s also there when the exceptional Pharrell veers into Ayn Randian bootstrapping territory. While he may have reached a higher plane of enlightenment via New Black re-invention, for many black people it’s more complicated, and hitting refresh on their blackness does not change anything.

I recently purchased music for the first time in years because I had lost control of what I was listening to. For the first time in a decade, I bought the songs I was enjoying. In light of a 12-hour road trip where fiddling around with my iPhone while driving wouldn’t be an option, I caved. While I pondered which songs I’d pay for, I realized this monetary exchange was monumental. My subconscious was coming in as Taylor Swift, insisting "There should be an inherent value placed on art." Yes, I thought, right now I am paying for art! Paying for this truly matters. Any shame I had was replaced by pride I was doing the right thing.

Shake Appeal, Evan Minsker's weekly garage/punk/psychedelic/etc. music round-up, kicks off 2015 with a stack of new stuff by Australian bands (Hierophants), Memphis icons (Jack Oblivian), West Coast oddballs (Jack Name), New York rippers (Pampers), and an Indiana garage pop outfit (Frankie and the Witch Fingers).

Album anniversary think pieces are butt. (Hell, most think pieces are, regardless of topic.) A collage of hastily-assigned, poorly executed attempts to try and reframe a cultural event for the sake of various groups, they wouldn't be all that bad if the folks these things attempted to reach had a semblance of a clue about music and culture. Instead, writers have to try and dig deep in front of an audience of shockingly out of touch young people who'd honestly rather be looking at NSFW Vine compilations, who wear ill-fitting leather jackets, and just discovered the phrase "Bye, Felicia" at Christmas dinner. It's a suicide mission at best, even if half of the pieces weren't going to suck anyways.

The Best Show, formerly the Best Show on WFMU, is a freeform radio show that has always had tremendous ties to the music world. Host Tom Scharpling formerly ran a small record label, his partner in comedy—Jon Wurster—is a member of Superchunk and the Mountain Goats. Tom has defined the show as being comprised of “three hours of mirth, music, and mayhem,” and while all three are always present in large doses, it’s the music that often serves as the heart of the show. Here are ten of the show’s most memorable music related moments, proving why The Best Show is deserving of its very rock’n’roll greatest hits box set and why FOTs (Friends of Tom, as fans of the show refer to themselves) all over the world are thrilled to have it back.